Cardington Crescent

"A detailed period puzzler suffused with atmosphere, emotion, and suspense!" BOOKLIST When George March, a womanizing aristocrat, is found dead over his morning coffee, his wife Emily is accused of murder. But Emily's sister is none other than the indomitable Charlotte Pitt. Together, she and her husband, Inspector Thomas Pitt, take on the seemingly irreproachable March clan--and uncover an insidious web of corruption and depravity that leads them from the elegant Crescent town house to the hideous London slumbs, from genteel society to murder--again.

Opinion

From the critics

Community Activity

Comment

Pitt's given a very lower class murder to solve--a woman has been butchered and her body left in packages all over London's slums. Pitt doesn't think he'll ever find out who she is--or was--except that her hands are soft enough that she probably was a domestic. Meantime, most of the March family is gathered at the London mansion of the male head of the family, a truly obnoxious man, for the summer season. Included is Emily, because she's married to George March, Lord Ashworth. Emily's miserable because George is infatuated with his cousin Sybilla. The other outsider is a handsome, charming young man being recruited as a husband for Tassie, the last unmarried March daughter. Neither's interested, but Tassie's father wants the marriage because he might get a peerage out of it. Two murders ensue, and the family wants to blame Emily, keeping the police out of it. Aunt Vespasia brings Charlotte, Emily's wellborn sister and Pitt's wife, in to help Emily, and to see if she can solve the murders. In the end, as in so many of the cases in this series, Pitt's and Charlotte's cases converge. I won't give the spoiler--I was surprised! One of the better books in the series.

This book is in high demand - I'm 26 in line for this book. Maybe it's because people think this is a new Anne Perry, as the date of publication is 2011. However, this is a re-release date. This book was originally published in 1987.